This podcast contains intense subject matter. Listener discretion is advised. I do think
he was capable of doing it, but it is strange because whatever happened happened
that night, and then he called me, you know, and he brought
me the girls the next day, and then he's the bonnie. So when
did he get rid of the body From the pages of the reporter's notebook?
This is still season two. I'm your host, Gary Anderson. Patty Otto's
sister, Alice Mills, has no doubt that Ralph Otto killed his wife the
nine of August thirty first, nineteen seventy six. What she doesn't know is
where Ralph took her body and how he managed to hide a murder victim without
anyone knowing. We've wondered that too, so we want to review the timeline
of his known whereabouts and floats some theories for how things could have played out.
I want to be clear though these theories are simply conjecture. We need
your help to determine if they line up with the truth. Someone out there
knows what happened to Patty Otto. Someone also knows who the Findlay Creek Jando
is, and if she's Patty so here we go with our impressions of Patty's
case. We know that Ralph and Patty fought sometime after she left her parents'
house at around eleven pm on August thirty first, Remember that was a Tuesday
night. Ralph told police Patty was already home when he returned at about midnight.
He said they fought, he went to sleep, and she left sometime
before he awoke the next morning. His next verified contact with anyone is sometime
after the sun rose September first. Witnesses said that he went to Bonnie shop
Bell's house with his two daughters before noon, but it's not clear exactly what
time he arrived. Just to remind you, Bonnie was Ralph's girlfriend before he
married Patty. He was helping Bonnie's brother transfer a refrigerator from Bonnie's house to
a moving van because she was leaving for California the following day. Ralph called
Alice around one and then took the girls to her house at about two.
His whereabouts for the remainder of the day are well accounted for. I didn't
realize he in all this time that he with Bonnie right away. I thought
when I had the girls that he disposed to for them. He brought me
to girls, but it sounds like he was with Bonnie. Ralph took Bonnie
shopping in Lewiston for a new outfit his going away present, and then they
had dinner with her parents, Wayne and Helen Bartlett. Other than telling people
that he couldn't find his wife, his behavior on September first didn't seem out
of the ordinary. So that's why. Now does it make more sense if
somebody else helped that night? Yeah, because I think he had it got
rid of it sometime in the beddle of night. How could he have been
so common next day with a body hanging around that's true, Well, this
is Ralph's soil. I guess he could have. But the Bartlett's dropped Ralph
off at his house between ten and ten thirty that night. His truck was
still in a sotan at Bonnie's parents house. The next morning, on September
second, Ralph called Bonnie and asked her a ride back to get his truck.
This is when his demeanor changed. Ralph sat down for breakfast at the
Bartlett's house but didn't eat. His eyes were red and watery, and he
was visibly upset. Bonnie said, he told her he had been up all
night and emphatically declared that Patty would not be coming back. Police interviewed the
Bartlett's about four months after this breakfast with Ralph. Bonnie's mom said she and
her husband had known Ralph for about twenty years. During the interview, which
police taped, Helen Bartlett said she didn't recall anything unusual about Ralph's behavior that
day, but she was also extremely tight lipped about what Ralph said the night
he told Bonnie he had killed Patty. Helen said, I wouldn't pay any
attention to anything he said. When police asked her what Annie had said about
Ralph's confession, she said, well, I don't even like to repeat it.
Detectives asked her why not, because I didn't pay too much attention to
it. Wayne and I both told her that, you know how he was
talking about that wire and just forget it. Ralph was apparently hallucinating that some
wire had gotten wrapped around his tire. Monnie told detective Tom Selene that Ralph
must have killed Patty between September first and September second. She had been with
him most of the day on September first, but he didn't start acting differently
until the following day, when he sat down with the Bartlets for breakfast.
Is it possible that Ralph did kill Patty late on August thirty first, the
night she disappeared, but stashed her body somewhere for twenty four hours until he
could get rid of her. As Alice said, it seems odd that he
could act so naturally knowing that a body was hidden in his house or somewhere
nearby. It's worth noting that Alice was inside his house as she looked around
briefly on September first. Other than a missing couch cushion, she didn't see
anything alarming. This is Christine reading from the transcript of what Alice told police
in a taped interview several days after Patty vanished. First I knocked and called
her name, and then I just went all through the house, kitchen,
bedroom's, living room, downstairs, I looked in the garage, and then
I just kind of walked around the yard. In that interview back in nineteen
seventy six, Selene wanted to be clear. He asked Alice, quote,
you were suspicious and thought he had done her in or something. She responded,
yes, In a previous episode, you also heard Alice say she was
nervous on that walk through and didn't linger when she looked around, she didn't
see any blood. The house was a mess, though, and Alice said
Patty would not have left it that way. On September two, the day
Bonnie said Ralph was acting strangely, Alice returned to the house to get closed
for the girls. This was the day Alice Saw's shovel leaning against the house
and a tarp spread out in the backyard. Patty's station wagon was also parked
in an unusual spot. It was on the side of the house, near
the door that led from the kitchen to the yard. Let's talk for a
minute about that station wagon. We are not certain of the exact model,
but we do know it was a nineteen seventy one Chevrolet. Chevy offered several
varieties of station wagons that year. Even though we don't know the exact model,
it's certain that it was roomy. Was that the kind that had the
third row of seats in the back that folded down. I'm not sure it
had a third row seat. I don't remember seeing a third row seat.
I just know it had a lot of storage back, you know, and
you had your front seat, back seat, and then it had the big
storage area okay, instead of having a trunk. But I don't remember third
row seats yet they were They were always sold it down. We wondered if
the cargo area was spacious enough to stash a body. We found someone in
New Mexico with a similar station wagon listed for sale. John Seyford's Chevy Wagon
is two years newer and maybe slightly smaller than Patti's was, but we figured
it was close enough in body style to be worth checking out. We asked
John if we could send someone by to look at it, Even though we
made it clear that we weren't interested in buying the vehicle, John was kind
enough to oblige kick it out. Did he tell you what this was about?
Yeah, you do a true crime. Yeah, so Gary does a
Gary Karen. They do a true crime podcast called Still and Our friends,
Jeff Wilson and Michelle Pool happened to be traveling through New Mexico recently and offered
to take a detour through the village of Pacas to look the car over a
compartment or their seat folds down and he just wanted me to stop, buy
and see is not even plausible? I would say absolutely yes. We had
one that style when I was a kid. Yeah, and we had the
seats that were in the back that would flowed out like that instead of instead
of like the backways like this way. They went side to side and had
like a little areas, so they were like opposing we had had. They
were opposing, and they had like a little area that would come up for
like a little seat or a little table as magnetics checkers, so they wouldn't
slide around. Okay, so that's plenty if I would definitely say there's plenty
of space, you're we going to look and take a look. This car
had been sitting unused for quite some time, and the tailgate had got and
jammed. I always think John gave Jeff and Michelle permission to pride open to
get a better look. Round wheel and the round keys from the square doors.
You don't mind me pulling on it? Whatever you need to may not
be possible, Yeah, I don't know it was. I tried to open
it the other day and I couldn't. I got the keys to turn.
I don't know if it's just frozen shut or I've got some pryebars if you
want, Um, do you have the keys to Oh you said it's in
the cognition. Yeah, the keys are in the cognition. Like I said,
the square keys are there. I mean the let's say, if we
can get this door open. Once they got the rear door open, they
saw the cargo space. Wow. We got ahold of GM's vehicle information kit
for nineteen seventy one Chevy Station wagons. Every model in the line had a
ton of unobstructed space in the rear cargo area. Vehicles without the third row
seat option had the most space. A removable or foldable platform divides the rear
base. Below the platform, there is a well between the wheels. Without
a third row of seats, the well space is more than four feet wide
and several feet long. Turn it turn the key. So how does this
fold up? You know? As far as I know, I think that
just flips back. Look at that. Wow, oh yeah, I can
totally fit in there. Okay, oh yeah, I can fit in there.
So the person was petite. I believe. I believe you could put
a person in here. Absolutely, that's probably three foot wide by I could
fit in there. You could for sure I'm five ten, so yeah,
yeah, if you're folded up pretty good, I think you probably you don't
even have to fold up pretty good. I mean if you just know,
like yeah, I just I just been in half I could fit. Well,
that's interesting. Yeah, I would say it's definitely possible to if there's
somebody in there. Our friend Michelle is about six inches taller than Patty was.
To test her assertion that she'd fit, Michelle climbed inside the well space.
Even with tools and a third row seat in the way, which Patty's
station wagon didn't have. She was almost able to fully curl up inside the
well. If the seat weren't there, she could have easily spread out and
be concealed under the platform. Something else to keep in mind is that Ralph's
friend Ron Roady told us that Ralph had gotten stuck at the top of a
runaway truck ramp. To refresh your memory, this is what he told us
in episode four. They had a Cheverley station wagon and Ralph I don't even
know why he told me or how he told me that he had been out
that night in the middle of the night. They were building the new Lewiston
Hill at the time. And he had gotten that station wagon stuck at the
top of one of the runaway truck gramps, in the gravel, and he
brought a bucket of that gravel home with him. So I always kind of
suspected that that's where he put her volley, is up in the deep gravel
of the runaway truck ramp, which would be a spot nobody would ever dig
up. That was always my suspicions. Ron said Ralph was driving the station
wagon, not his truck. It seems bizarre to us that someone would attempt
to drive any kind of vehicle on top of a gravel runaway tru truck ramp.
Those ramps, which are built into the side of a steep hill,
are designed to let the driver of a semitruck essentially bury his rig deep into
an enormous pile of gravel if his brakes give out, stopping the truck from
careening out of control. Now, maybe when Ron referred to Ralph getting stuck
at the top of one of those ramps, he didn't mean literally on top
of the gravel. Let's just assume that's even possible. Whatever his reason might
have been for attempting such a thing, why would he do it in a
station wagon when he had a truck at his disposal. The answer might be
that he had left his truck at Bonnie's parents house overnight between September first and
September second, and the station wagon was still parked outside his house and available
for him to drive. Patty hadn't taken off in it, and Ralph said
himself that she wasn't coming back. We don't think he would have hidden Patty's
body in the station wagon for a full day until he had time to bury
her. The next night, on that September first, the temperature rose to
one hundred degrees in Lewiston. If he had waited to bury her, she
had to have been stashed somewhere else. Alice didn't see her anywhere in the
house. Was there another place he could have hidden her body temporarily until he
could safely dispose of it. We do know that Ralph had a chest style
freezer in the basement. In a previous episode, we talked about Ralph's brother
Ray and his sister in law Dodie, searching Ralph's house for clues about Patty's
whereabouts in early November of nineteen seventy six. During one of those searches,
the couple noted that they found a hotel key on the basement floor near the
freezer. We don't think Ralph kept our body there for weeks, but it
could have been in the freezer for a day. When we interviewed Selene,
he told us he didn't think that was the case. Though I can't be
sure of that, but I would say absolutely not in my judgment. Okay.
We'd like to note, though, that the house wasn't searched by police
until several days after Patty disappeared. That gave Ralph time to move her body,
even if it had been temporarily stored on his property. Police probably looked
in the freezer during one of their walkthroughs, but there may have been no
visible evidence that Patty had been put there. We're not crime scene technicians,
so we don't know what specific clues police may have looked for. Keep in
mind, though, the freezer is just our theory. Until this episode,
we've tried to be objective and have consciously tried not to make the seemingly random
bits and pieces of evidence fit our theories about what happened that night and whether
Patty Otto is to Findley Creek Jane Doe. But this seems like a good
time to float another idea that's continually nagged at us. It's about those boots
that were found on the Jane Doe. After studying the photos from the crime
scene for a while, we started to intently focus on the boots, and
we're just trying to, you know, say, couldn't I saw the pictures
of those boots, those boots, so we'll talk about Yes, those are
not Patty's boots. Alice was certain about that, and she didn't recall if
Ralph ever wore footwear like the boots found in the Jane Doo's grave either,
nor did she recall him walking with a limp causing uneven wear on the sole
of one of those shoes. But a tiny thread does provide a loose connection
between the boots and Ralph. When Ralph and Bonnie went shopping on September first,
one of the places they went was a store called Javvy Bootery. We
didn't pay much attention to this detail when we first read about it in the
police reports, but during our research we came across a few articles written about
this locally owned chain of stores. The first Javvy store opened as a specialty
shop for prescription and orthopedic shoes. By the mid nineteen seventies, the store
had added fashioned footwear to its stock, but its bread and butter was still
what we had now call comfort shoes. We believe that the ankle high boots
the Jane Dooe was wearing when she was found looked like a pair of desert
Chucka boots, which were originally designed in nineteen fifty by Clarks. If you're
not familiar with the Clark's brand, it's known for crafting shoes that are designed
for comfort. The classic desert boot is iconic for the brand. It's a
very interesting coincidence that Ralph was shopping at a store that sold similar footwear to
what the finlaycrete Jane Doe was wearing, and he made a purchase there on
the same day Patty vanished. Alice Mills told us that Patty usually wore tennis
shoes, and she assumed that she was wearing them when she vanished. But
what if Patty wasn't wearing shoes when Ralph got home, If she had been
home for more than a few minutes before Ralph walked in and they started fighting,
it's plausible that she had already taken off her shoes. Remember it was
fairly late at night. If Ralph killed her that night and waited to dispose
of her body, it may not have occurred to Ralph until he got to
the burial site that he had a problem. If her body was ever discovered,
his lie about her leaving in the middle of the night wouldn't make sense.
If she was barefooted, she wouldn't have walked out without shoes, especially
if she never planned to return. In that case, it might make sense
to take off his own shoes, maybe a pair he bought for himself at
Javy Boottery, and put them on her feet. That might explain why he
was wandering around his own yard while wearing insulated coveralls but no shoes on September
fifth, nineteen seventy six, If you recall, that's when his brother stopped
by his house and found Ralph dressed bizarrely and in a stupor. We know
it's a stretch, but what if we have good reason to hope that we'll
soon have more than theories and loose connections to tie these cases together. At
least two of the people actively involved in the Finlay Creek Jandoe Task Force have
played a significant role in getting other cases solved. Anthony Redgray developed the composite
sketch of the Jane Doe that first caught Suzanne's attention last year. He also
created a rendering of a man whose skull was found in an agricultural field in
nineteen eighty three. This is Anthony talking so the case that we just closed
out at the end of last year, Bill Lewis, who was previously an
unidentified victim of Larry Eiler. Larry Eiler is believed to have murdered at least
twenty one young men between nineteen eighty two and nineteen eighty four. He had
a really awful forensic image prior to the one that the one that I did
because it was based on if I'm remembering this directly, it was based on
the description that Larry Eiler gave to a status artist. It wasn't based on
the remains because the skull was actually really damaged when they recovered it because it
was an an agricultural field. Um, this is the second time I've done
a reconstruction image off of somebody whose remains were damaged in an agricultural field,
and so I was pretty comfortable taking that taking that on. So what happened
was the entire midface was was damaged, and I worked with my anthropology consultants
to infer the features that should have been there, and you know, the
whole time we were working on the genealogy of the case, I was like,
you know, I feel like, I feel really confident that this is
really good art, but you know, there was so much that was missing,
and I really trust my anthropology consultants, but how can I be sure
that this is one percent like or needing even ninety percent you know close?
And we ended up getting really alarmingly close to what he actually looked like.
And I'll send you our case stage on that one, because we have the
forensic art and a photo of him side by side, and honestly, it
was in really the remainder are in really rough shape. But I think that
so far, that's been the closest I've gotten with a reconstruction image. DNA
analysis confirmed that the man Anthony's art work closely resembled was indeed Bill Lewis.
Jason Fudge, one of the Finlay Creek Task Force leaders, also investigated a
John Doe case before taking on the Finlay Creek mystery. His research, including
interviews with law enforcement, helped them identify a man who had been brutally murdered
in Florida. Here's Jason, and what I hear not law enforcement one,
but when I hear from the family members themselves that I was pretty much responsible
for at least getting their brother identified. I I feel good about it,
and I feel like I have contributed something to this field. The Findlay Creek
Jainedoe Task Force and a team of advocates for Patty Otto, including her daughter
Suzanne and Suzanne's cousin Jennifer Harrington, have been working relentlessly to get authorities to
take another look at the two cases. The group has been talking with Department
of Justice representatives and has gotten help from a forensic odentologist to reevaluate X rays
of Patti Auto and compare them to the Jain Doe. They believe a match
should have never been ruled out. Here's Melinda Jetterberg. That's kind of what
we're looking at right now. It's like, prove it isn't her, because
they can't, then they can't. So far, they have not been able
to do it, so before they could get help from a tooth expert,
they needed additional copies of Pattiotto's dentol X rays to provide. Lewis and Police
and an odentologist. Jennifer went on a mission to find a dental office that
still had a machine to duplicate film, and I finally found somebody that could
do it. It was a long process, but I ended up at doctor
doctor Earls, the one who took the original panel. Doctor Shepherd purchased his
practice. I popped in there and had a great conversation with him. He
said that they were fully digital now, but he has sold his duplicator to
another doctor in town, doctor Wilson. So you might give doctor Wilson's office
to call and see if they still have it. They were closed then,
so I continued doing my search through the evening. That's Jennifer Harrington talking.
You'll hear what sounds like a lot of static as she continues talking. We
recorded this conversation in the woods of Oregon, and bugs were interfering with our
audio. Really nice lady named Tamara answers the phone. No, we're all
digital, we don't have a duplicator, and so I start just kind of
explaining this is for a missing person from the seventies, that we have this
one copy of this panel and we need an additional one to provide the police
department for an identification purpose. And okay, well, wait a minute,
our office in Palmray might have one. And I never ever go through Palm
Ray. But I was coming over to Walla, Walla and I was going
to drive right through Palm Ray, and so she checked, Yes, they
have a duplicator. We can facilitate that for you. It'll take a couple
of days. I'm like, no, I'm driving through Palm Ray this afternoon.
I can stop. They close at three, and my timing with a
doctor's appointment, I got there at five minutes till three, and I got
it duplicated. So we have the duplicate from the police department. But here's
where the story gets really interesting. I'm still on the phone with Tiama.
She's told me they can do it and everything, and she says, so,
which department are you with? Said, oh, no, I'm not
with a department. I'm a family member of the missing person, and we,
as the family, have a copy that we need to give it to
the police department. She said, Oh, my dad was a police officer
back and around that time frame, so this kind of stuff always is interesting
to me. And I was just about to say something more than I was
like, well, who is your dad? Duyne Naylor? Oh, I
was talking to Dwayne Ayler's daughter on the phone, and she is the one
who facilitated getting that copy made for us, of all the people in the
world, And it's not an office I would have called on my own.
I was led there through doctor Earl, through doctor Shepherd, and Duyanne Nayler's
daughter found the duplicator for me, and I just happened to be going through
that town that afternoon. Anyway, you probably remember that Duane Ayler is the
police captain that Ralph tried to have killed. While we're on the subject of
Ayler, I wanted to touch on something else. People have asked us if
Ralph was as upset about Patty's brief relationship with Randy Benton as it appeared,
why did he put a hit on the police captain instead of the man Patty
had an affair with. Ralph had told plenty of people he wanted Randy dead
and even carried around a gun with that intent. In a twisted sort of
way, we can kind of understand that Ralph wanted the satisfaction of killing Randy
himself. And sure, maybe Ralph had a burning hatred of Aylor too,
But if so, why would he delegate the dirty deed of killing him to
someone else. Maybe the answer is that he didn't really care one way or
another about Aylor. Ralph often said that if he had truly wanted the police
captain dead, he would have killed him himself. Maybe Ayler was simply collateral
damage in Ralph's mind. Look at it this way. If you truly want
investigators focused on something other than you, you need to create a diversion.
A sure fire distraction would be for one of their own to get murdered.
It's a fairly well accepted truth that police officers form a brotherhood of sorts.
If one of their brothers had been killed, Ralph could safely bet that most
of the department's resources would be focused on solving that murder, not looking into
the disappearance of his wife. If he orchestrated that murder, he needed to
distance himself from it as much as possible. Ralph was making plans to leave
town when the hit was supposed to take place. He was going to take
his daughters to Disneyland, far away from Lewistown, so the murder wouldn't be
connected to him. He also chose to put a hit on someone other than
the detective most directly involved in investigating Patty's disappearance. He picked the police captain
instead. We certainly don't know if Ralph actually put that much thought into his
murder for Higher plot, but we know he was a cunning man, and
if we believe that someone helped him get rid of Patty's body, maybe someone
was also providing counsel about how to deflect attention from himself. As we told
you previously, not long after Ralph went to prison for the murder for Higher
scheme, one of his close friends, a woman we've referred to as Eve,
shot her own husband, nearly killing him. Suzanne shared some of the
letters Ralph wrote to Eve while he was in prison. The letters were confiscated
by police in their search of Eve's property after she shot her husband. In
the letters, it's clear that Ralph and Eve shared more than friendship. He
was even making plans to shift custody of his daughters to Eve. We asked
Eve's grandson if he believes his grandmother could have been directly involved in Patty's disappearance.
I mean I know, or more I know, or better than anybody.
I mean, I've been around her, and I've seen her attitude,
and I've felt the strangeness that she puts off. But like I said,
I never really thought a whole lot of it. I always thought I was
just being paranoid. Do you believe she would kill somebody? Honestly? I
do? I mean I really do. I told Susanne that I believe with
everything in my heart and in my brain and just everything I've I've witnessed and
I've been around her, I believe that she did it herself, or she
definitely got rid of the body, you know what I mean. I mean,
she had something to do with this, or did it herself. There
is no other if, ander butt or any other way. We've been advised
against contacting Eve to avoid compromising a possible police investigation. It's fairly easy for
us to suggest what seems likely, or take the little bits of information we
have and make them fit a particular theory, but it really is just our
speculation. We truly have no way of knowing what really happened that night,
unless someone who saw something or has direct knowledge comes forward. That's what this
case really needs. Secrets are hard to keep, and someone out there knows
more than they've told authorities. We know that Ralph unburdened his conscience by talking
to friends about that night. Whether what he said was mere hallucination or an
actual confession, he clearly felt some level of guilt. And if he told
one friend something, he surely told someone else even more. This is our
plea for answers. Here's tom Selene again. Either he did something himself or
has somebody else helped him, and we don't know who that is, right,
and I think the only way that we're going to solve this case now
is to find the body or get someone to talk that he talked to or
that was involved. I really regret that that case was not solved. I
really wanted it to be solved. There's no doubt in my mind that he
has responsibility. Typically, at this point in the episode, we'd give you
a hint about what you'll hear next time on Still, but we won't be
doing that today because even we don't know what that may be. There are
a lot of moving parts in this investigation right now, so we're going to
pause for a bit as exciting things develop. We'll pick up the story when
we're in a position to fill you in on what's happening. I think it'll
be worth the way, so keep an eye out for new episodes dropping soon.
Anyone with information pertaining to the disappearance of Patricia Otto should contact the Lewiston
Police Department's tipline at two zero eight to nine eight nine three nine. Anyone
with information pertaining to the identity of the Finland Creek Jane Doe, or other
information related to that case should contact the Union County District Attorney at DA at
Union hyphen County dot org. If you, or anyone you know is a
victim of domestic abuse, please contact the National Domestic Violence Hotline at eight hundred
seven nine nine. Safe Still is a production of The Reporter's Notebook and Grayson
Shaw Media. You can connect with us online at the Reporter's Notebook dot com
or via email at info at the Reporter's Notebook dot com. Still was researched,
written, and produced by Karen Shaw Anderson. Additional research in script editing
provided by Christine Hughes. Original music by Smith Huosso. Additional narration provided by
Sarah Morgan. I'm your host and associate producer Gary Anderson. Special thanks to
everyone who graciously provided interviews. We would specifically like to thank the advocates for
Pattiato, the Findley Creek Task Force, and contributing investigators Jeff Wilson and Michelle
Poole. Like follow and subscribe to Still on your favorite podcast platform, and
follow us on Facebook or Twitter to join the conversation. Ezekiel thirty four sixteen.
I will seek the lost, and I will bring back the stray,
and I will bind up the injured, and I will strengthen the weak.